Karen Brewer

Year End Report 2009, Darien,CT Real Estate, Homes,Condos and Land

So, after all the jawboning and constant “pot watching” ,how did the year 2009 turn out for Darien,CT real estate?

Well, actually not  too badly. Bear in mind, that 2009 followed what was arguably the worst year in recent history for the homebuyers and sellers alike and that no analysis would be complete without reexamining 2008. Suffice it to say that 2008 saw home values in Darien and surrounding towns down around 22% and volume down nearly 50%.

The hardest hit segment in the town of Darien  in 2009 was land. Builders ran for cover,ceased acquiring property and basically stopped building, sometimes mid project.Darien is  nearly 98% built. Even so NO land was sold in 2009 off from just 2 parcels sold in 2008.

Darien condominiums sales fared slightly better with 10 closings in ’09 versus 11 in 2008. Average price was down neasrly 10% from $638,00 to $576,000.

A total of 180 homes in Darien were sold versus 187 in 2008 indicating the end of the market free fall and hopefully entering a leveling out phase for a loss of 3.7%.

Average sale price in Darien real estate was down 7.3% from $1,558,000 in ’08 to $1.444,275 in ’09. In 2009, the upper tier of the market namely, $3 million and up remained very soft. The vast majority of sales were closed in the entry level range of $600,000 to $1.500,000 owing to low interest rates and governmental tax programs.

Interestingly in the last four weeks of 2009 there was an unusual uptick in homes sales. Generally December is a very quiet month in the market. This year however 23 home sales were recorded versus just 7 in 2008. Clearly home buyers are out there and waiting for the right combination of price and location.

So whats in the crystal ball for 2010? Strictly anecdotally, the  Darien market has been buoyed by the recent December activity and agents and sellers alike are optimistic. On the plus side, there are various market forces at work including historically low interest rates and inventory levels that have stabilized. Further, announcements concerning Wall Street bonus pools are encouraging for the Darien real estate market which is dependent on those payouts.

Unfortunately, significant downward pressures still remain Credit markets have become difficult to navigate. New regulations have slowed down the mortgage process. Without adequate “comparable sales” information, assessments continue to be a point of contention between buyers, sellers and lenders.

Darien has not been extensively affected by the foreclosure crisis (there have been approximately 12 in town). However, should that trend accelerate, as some predict, it could place further pressure on prices in town.Lets hope we’ve seen the last of them.

While many have pronounced the recession over, I predict a slow recovery for the real estate market in Darien and surrounding towns with prices continuing to stabilize or trend slightly downward. I believe the worst is behind us.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 12th, 2010 at 3:49 pm and is filed under Buyers, Market Trends, Sellers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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